Singaporeans, turtle skirt and South African wines as investments(2)

            I nominated those same wineries as having established track records
            for producing fine ageable wines over consecutive vintages. But I
            had to acknowledge that we have no icon wine where older vintages
            appreciate in value, on a par with Grange. So I took the question to
            Roland Peens of Cape Town's fine wine brokers and wine storage
            facility Wine Cellar.
            Peens says he's successfully sold older vintages of Kanonkop Paul
            Sauer, Meerlust Rubicon and Boekenhoutskloof Syrah for upwards of
            R600 or R700 per bottle (they charge a 20% brokerage fee). He's also
            seen earlier vintages of Vergelegen V sell online for over R1000,
            after release prices in the R700 range. Sadie Family's Columella
            fetches these figures too a few years after release, but then
            Columella achieves higher prices to start with. Peens agrees that we
            don't have a South African Grange, pointing out that it's difficult
            to develop a proper market for fine wines amongst South African
            collectors, local collectors being so niche they barely count. In
            comparison a huge amount of merchants in the UK offer vintage French
            wines.
            One problem is that South Africa doesn't have a secondary market.
            Lacking the UK's bonded warehouses and auctions of wine for
            investments (where many Asian collectors also store their wines), it
            means every time wine is sold, duty and taxes are payable to the
            government. Buying wine from a bonded warehouse in the UK, those
            taxes aren't paid until the buyer requests to have the wine
            released. When fine wine is sold as a potential investment in South
            Africa, the duties and taxes have to be paid every time. And with
            our high interest rates, most South Africans would rather back an
            interest-bearing account to deliver. In wine you're not guaranteed a
            return.
            This point might be overlooked if South African wines were
            considered rare enough. One such exception is the George Spies
            Cabernet Sauvignon 1966 from Stellenbosch. You've probably read
            about the wine being awarded 95 points in Wine Spectator by James
            Molesworth during a 2007 South African visit. "I found a bottle of
            George Spies 1968 for R10 in a bargain bin," Peens continued. "We
            had it at a tasting the other day and it was phenomenal. It should
            be selling for thousands of Rand on a wine auction."
            Peens wondered if the correct interpretation should be that great
            South African investment wines were amongst those made pre-1980s.
            "We don't seem to have a market for glorious older vintages. But I
            don't believe in local wines from the eighties or early nineties,"
            he admitted candidly.
            Tasting two impressive wine releases last week, the Vilafont?Series
            C 2006, and Morgenster 2005, I thought about local investment wines
            again. Both wines exhibit elegant blending, fine tannins and
            cellaring ability; initial vintages being held back until their
            makers were confident of what was in the bottle. Both achieved
            Platter five-star ratings for the first time in 2009, and have
            cellar door prices upwards of R300. Considerable thought and cash
            injections went into vineyard and cellar practices, and foreign
            expert input came from Americans Phil Freese and Zelma Long
            (Vilafont?, and Pierre Lurton (Morgenster) respectively. Although
            not referring to these wines specifically, Peens' outlook for
            top-end local wines seemed more optimistic going forward. "Perhaps
            South African wines are getting better and more age-worthy. Maybe in
            10 years the investment picture will be different," he suggested.
            I think he's right. Are wines such as Series C and Morgenster going
            to drink better after a few years of ageing? Unquestionably. Neither
            have the track record and history of South African competitor
            wineries, and there is no certainty that either wine will appreciate
            in value. But with world stock markets in flux, I reckon there would
            be riskier moves than gambling on a case or two of each. If all else
            fails, you could follow the example of the MRTs in Singapore after a
            few years cellaring, and drink it.